Are you struggling with loneliness? Have you ever felt alone even though you were surrounded by people?. Have you felt distress at sensing there is a kind of gap between your desire to connect and the absence of another person?
I certainly have! I have lived in different countries, I have had to adapt to different cultures and, many times, I have felt that I don’t belong or that I can’t connect with others. And my feeling of loneliness grew even more when, in my desire to share with others, they didn’t understand me and I actually felt almost judged…
Several years ago I began to study the effect of trauma on attachment, and I understood how loneliness affects me, how it affects all of us, and that’s what I want to talk about in this article.
So, if you are struggling with this feeling, I invite you to read it to the end.
Loneliness: why does it affect us so much?
We are social beings and bonding with others is a BIOLOGICAL NEED. We are designed for it.
In fact, connection provides us with physical, emotional, psychological and spiritual WELLBEING. We cannot survive without connections.
If we are ill, or have lived through a tragedy, and we have company and support, we will recover more quickly.
When we are seen or valued, our self-esteem improves, we become more empathetic, more trusting, we are better people. On the other hand, in the same way, when we feel alone for a long time, we can become withdrawn, we become ILL physically, psychologically and spiritually.
What is emotional loneliness?
Without a doubt, this feeling is experienced somewhat differently in each person. For some, it can be a lack of social interaction; while for others, despite having a lot of “social interaction”, they carry a masked feeling and feel that their life has no meaning, they can’t connect deeply and, therefore, they also feel alone.
That’s why, in a way, we can say that having the company of another person, or “having it all”, is the passport to avoiding feeling alone.
Do you feel alone? Do you feel you are slipping into depression and anxiety?
Loneliness doesn’t respect profession or social class. A person can be the life of the party, have thousands of followers and, even so, feel alone. They can have a partner and feel alone. SADLY a large part of the population HAS NO ONE TO TRUST.
The pain of feeling alone, over time, can make a person start to disconnect, to numb themselves, and come to think: “I’m always going to be alone”, “life has no meaning”, etc.
That is when the feeling of loneliness becomes fertile ground for anxiety and depression, and hope is lost. Hopelessness is a dangerous place because everything is abandoned, you stop fighting, and you can fall into a feeling of failure and unhappiness.
Hope is the fuel that gives us the strength to carry on, to look for options and to broaden our range of possibilities.
If you feel this way, remember that your need to connect is NOT A WHIM, it is our fuel.
Humanity is sick with emotional loneliness, because it isn’t connected. At times, children don’t know how to connect with each other, children with parents… In short: with one another.
The real problem is that we aren’t reconnected with ourselves.
So: answer these questions for yourself, and honestly:
Do you take time to feel what you feel, to observe what is happening inside you?
How does loneliness feel in your body?
How does it affect you, what does it make you think about yourself, about others and about the world?
What does this feeling of loneliness produce in you … distress, sadness?
Can you feel these emotions?
How to overcome the feeling of distress and depression caused by emotional loneliness?
I am going to share with you what has worked for me, so you can start practising it. On my journey through loneliness, these are some things that helped me:
Take responsibility: you have to recognise that you have a problem and that we are the only ones who can get ourselves out of this state. Denial and shame only make the problem bigger.
Examine your beliefs: Can you go out to eat, to the cinema, to a concert, alone? There are patients who, when I suggest this, feel uncomfortable. Curiously, I have observed that they feel “ashamed of being alone”.
One patient told me: “they’ll think I’m weird or feel sorry for me because I don’t have friends”.
Maybe you can challenge this thought and start seeing yourself as a person who enjoys their own company, who loves you and who is free!
I propose to you:
To start fighting the feeling of loneliness, you can try these tips starting today:
1. Make a list of the people you can talk to, who care about you. When you enter the spiral of loneliness, you sometimes forget the support you have.
2. Get up from that chair and go out for a walk every day, even if it’s only for 20 minutes, and greet at least three people, looking them in the eye and smiling. Because this will increase the hormones that produce wellbeing.
3. Limit your use of social media.
4. Use your time alone to connect with yourself, becoming a good friend to yourself.
5. Seek professional help, (online therapy is an excellent option) can be “your antidote” against depression, substance abuse or even staying in toxic relationships out of fear of the feeling of loneliness.
Are you still struggling with the distress, still haven’t found a way to start fighting this harmful feeling? Are you still struggling with loneliness?. Don’t let any more time go by. Wherever you are, with online therapy, I can help you as a professional, but above all as someone who has also felt and suffered what you are suffering now. I understand you and I know how to help you. Contact me..